Come Sunday: A Novel (4 page)

“Can you watch Cleo tonight for two or three hours? I want to take Greg out to a movie,” I ask.

“Sure!” she croons. “Going to fool around with the preacher man, are you?” Theresa told Jenny and me that after sixteen years of marriage and three kids, she and Jakes still have sex every night. We have made allowances, therefore, for her one-track-mindedness, and try not to stare at Jakes at every church potluck.

“Fat chance! Can I bring her by at six-thirty?” I ask. “I’ll feed her first.”

“No, no, we’re having pizza tonight, bring her for dinner.”

“You’re the best.”

“That’s what Jakie says!”

“By the way, tell him the roof leaked and to come by when he has a free moment.”

“You know, I swear that man is good for one thing, and one thing only! Oh hell, I’ve got to go, the boys are having a food fight!”

I hang up and look for Greg, who is in the garage cleaning up the mess.

“We’re going out tonight. I’ll pick you up at six!” I tell him.

He is surprised, and a bit pleased. “What’s the occasion?”

“You and me being an old married couple, that’s what,” I say. “Theresa’s going to watch Cleo.”

“Can we sit in the back row and make out?”

“Only during the trailers,” I say.

It is six-thirty when I pack down the layers of tulle of Cleo’s pink tutu so that I can buckle her seat belt. “We’re late!” I snap as Greg lifts up the garage door.

“Mommy, it’s okay, don’t be mad,” Cleo says. Immediately chastised, I take my seat and give myself the mental talk about not sabotaging the fun before it has started.

“I’ll get you there in time for the trailers,” smiles Greg as he pats my knee and backs out of the garage. I have to unbuckle my belt, get out, and pull the door down manually. I glance over at Mrs. Chung’s front doorstep and notice the box of Ziplocs and the bag of dog turds are gone, but as we drive past the house the blinds of her living room window swing slightly from where she has no doubt been peeping. The storm clouds fold over the hills again and the town below looks like it needs to be wrung out.

The island is least appealing when it is overcast. When the sun is shining and the cartoon clouds cast big shadows on the evergreen mountains, Hawaii has the most chance of living up to its reputation.
You can overlook the congested neighborhood streets where the single-wall construction houses have given up even elbow room. You can put up with the potholed roads, the rust-stained buildings, and the crumbling lava-rock walls because just an arm’s length away are the brightest rainbows you’ll ever see. Crane your neck past the high-rises in Waikiki and you will see an ocean whose colors defy adjectives. Look close enough and you’ll see, among the folds of the Pali Mountains, ribbons of waterfalls. But on damp days like these, there’s no masking the deterioration, no sun to keep at bay the creeping edges of third-world neglect.

The worst of it is summed up on the street where Theresa lives. Downhill from us, wedged in the valley, is River Street. A misnomer, it is nothing like the picture its name conjures. No quaint plantation houses with sprawling backyards sloping down to a willow-tree-lined stream. Just cramped shacks jammed in a one-way lane that dead-ends by a ditch filled only with litter and a few old tires. Not even a trickle, even after the rains. It is a shantytown street hiding behind the storefronts of Mr. Woo’s Laundromat and Phuong-Thai Takeout. River Street is the back-alley neighborhood that could have been imported from District Six or Soweto. The slouched bodies that stand in the doorways are not black, however, but mostly Asian. The slope of their shoulders and the weary looks of hopelessness are the same as those of township people, ghetto people, people hanging on by their fingernails.

Greg stops the car in the middle of the street because there is no parking place at house number 121, a house the size of our soggy garage, a house with two front doors. 121B is open, and on the front step that doubles as a porch is Theresa’s daughter Tess hanging over the railing. She sees us and with a sticky hand pushes back the sweaty black strands of hair from her face and cries out, “Hi, Cleo!”

I follow Cleo up the stairs and watch the two girls embrace. Cleo, a year younger than Tess, is the same height. They examine each other’s outfits and immediately exchange shoes. When Cleo insists on wearing the frilly pink dress Tess refuses to take off, a scuffle ensues. I begin insisting Cleo mind her manners, but Theresa sweeps Cleo into her
arms, twirls her high in the air, and says, “Come, now, a princess like you needs something with a bit more pizzazz, don’t you think? Come look what Auntie Theresa bought for you today.” She latches Cleo to her hip and reaches for the shopping bag on the couch. When Cleo peers in, she exclaims with delight.

“I want to try it on!” She grins.

Theresa winks at me.

“Thank you,” I say.

She shakes her head. “You just go have a good time now, you hear, and don’t be rushing back.”

“We won’t be later than nine-thirty,” I promise. “Greg’s got to get up for Good Friday. You coming to the service?”

“Nah, too morbid for me. I’ll go to both services on Easter to make up for it, how’s that?”

“Deal.”

“Go, already!” she orders me out.

I bend down. “Cleo, have fun; be a good girl, okay? And remember to put your hand over your mouth when you cough. Now give me a kiss.” But she ignores me. “Kiss?” Instead, she takes Theresa’s hand and asks her to help her put on the dress.

“Bye, baby!” I yell out the window of the car, but the two girls are already immersed in the world of princesses and monsters and purple nail polish. I roll up the window and Greg and I are sealed in air-conditioned silence, suddenly strangers.

“Got your sermon ready for tomorrow?” I ask.

“Oh, I guess. Nobody wants to hear much about executions just two days before Easter. Theresa coming?”

“Nope.”

“See what I mean?”

Greg pretends he isn’t perpetually disappointed with his flock, even though it doesn’t afford him the same courtesy. Continuing its decline in membership and income, the church has started to look for a scapegoat, and the pastor who had been packaged and delivered to them with such promise has become the obvious candidate. Greg’s defense, if he had the will to offer it, would be to point out the congregation’s
lukewarm commitment to the faith, its country-club approach to the Gospel, its cut-and-paste theology. Instead, he has increased the church’s budget, sparking severe rows over a spending deficit, so while the budget continues to grow like a fatted calf, it seems Greg is all but taking a knife to his own throat.

Even though what would suit Greg more is a position in headquarters, something requiring the production of surveys and charts and reports with words like “strategy” and “benchmark,” he should, in my opinion, be putting up more of a fight. Or if not a fight, then at least a show. Instead, each Sunday morning, when he preaches to more vacant pews than occupied ones, I can see him straining and stumbling through his sermon as though lugging the deadweight of a gargantuan corpse behind him, not an inspiring picture of the Body of Christ. The congregation’s routine lack of enthusiasm is perfectly suited for only one service a year: Good Friday. It’s ironic that no more than a dozen will attend tomorrow.

We do not speak again until we are at the theater, and then only to debate briefly the options. The romantic comedy wins and we take our seats, several rows from the back. Greg reaches for my hand, and for one bizarre moment I feel like grabbing his face and kissing him with the zeal of a sixteen-year-old.

It is a silly movie, and it ends with all the predictable charm of apple pie à la mode. For two hours we have pretended to be lovers on a date, a feeling that is remotely familiar. “We should do this more often,” says Greg as we make our way back to the car.

“We should kiss more often,” I say, and immediately regret it because it sounds like an accusation.

“Like this?” Greg kisses the way he shaves, the way he first prepares, then delivers, sermons. Meticulously. And there is nothing wrong with a meticulous kiss, but it is a dirty kiss the day calls for, and only when I smother his best intentions with a mouth bent on foul play is he aroused.

“A brazen hussy,” he says. “Want to come to my place and see my etchings?”

“Why not?” I answer.

The car clock says 9:25 when Greg starts the ignition.

“We’re going to be late,” I observe.

“You say that too much.”

The roads are shiny with rain and the windshield wipers flip-flap against the downpour.

“Think she’s asleep?” asks Greg. Neither of us wants to think about the roof and what the garage will look like when we get home.

“Wired, more like it.”

I check the time at every red light and stop sign.

At 9:52 we turn onto River Street, and even before we reach their home I can tell something is wrong. Lights are on in all the houses and every door is open, like gaping mouths. People are standing in groups under umbrellas on either side of the road, and they stare like deer at our approaching headlights.

“Greg?” I frown, feeling the lurch in my chest.

On the porch of 121B, Theresa’s mother stands with Tess on her hip. The child looks frightened while the old woman keeps watch, stroking her hair rigorously. A police car blocks the street and an officer is talking to the Korean woman who lives at 121A. Something is very wrong. And among all these faces I notice only one missing: Cleo’s.

I am out the car before Greg has stopped it completely, tripping up the stairs to the old woman.

“Where’s Cleo?” I ask, panic swelling in my throat. “What happened?” I look into her shrunken eyes, but she can only shake her head.

“WHAT, for chrissake?” I shout, but the officer is next to me now and asks, “Reverend and Mrs. Deighton?”

Ignoring him, I clutch at the old woman, and Tess begins to wail while Greg steps around me and says, “Yes?”

Theresa’s mother moves her mouth, garbling sounds I cannot understand. Impulsively, my hand rises to slap her because I think she is hysterical, when from behind me the words “accident” and “car” and “hospital” embed themselves in my flesh like leeches. I swing around to the officer, who has taken off his hat, and cover my own mouth. “No, nononononono . . .” I shriek, and turn wildly wanting to run.

Greg grabs me. “Get in the car, Abbe, the policeman’s going to take us to the hospital.” A uniformed hand holds open the back door and I tumble into what seems like a black hole. As the siren begins to wail, it is into this deep chasm that I begin to pray. “Please, God, please, please let her be okay.” The faces lining the streets are hollow.

The robotic voice on the car radio reports that Cleo has been moved from the emergency room to the ICU. I clutch Greg’s hand and
squeeze it hard. I look into his face, white with shock, searching for his assurance—she’s in the ICU, that’s good, right? She’ll be okay, won’t she? But he says nothing, eyes locked ahead, the desperate expression of a man with his head held underwater by an invisible hand.

The police car’s digital clock blinks 10:06 when we pull into the emergency room parking lot.

Maundy Thursday, I think suddenly, the night Jesus went up to the olive orchard lit by a pale moon to pray.
Remove this cup from me
. The night his closest friends fell asleep after they dutifully promised to keep watch. There is no moon when we step out of the police car and into the bright light of the Queen’s Medical Center foyer. But I need Beauty to walk out into the dark and retrieve from its bowels the offerings that will turn a bad moon good.

We run down a long, sterile corridor to the elevators. I stand and look at the round numerals light up: 8, 7, 6. A century goes by before the vault doors open, another universe collapses on itself before they close. The fourth floor is deserted, and we run down another hallway, heading for the double doors with a sign saying AUTHORIZED PERSONNEL ONLY.

“Cleo Deighton,” Greg says to the male nurse behind the desk. “Where is she?”

“Mr. and Mrs. Deighton?” he asks, to which we both nod. “She has just been taken down to the OR. Let me call one of the physicians to come and talk to you.”

“Please,” Greg says, reaching across the table and grabbing his arm before it can reach the receiver. “How is she?”

The man, plump and rosy-cheeked, looks around for help. Seeing no one, he smooths his hair and replies in a soft voice, “She has sustained significant brain trauma and loss of blood from an aortic tear. She’s in critical condition, I am afraid, but we have managed to stabilize her blood pressure so the surgeon can operate.” He looks at Greg. “I am sorry, but you will have to talk to the attending physician to find out more.”

“Jesus, oh Jesus,” I whisper, trying to assemble Cleo with “brain trauma” and “aortic tear.”

“Where is she?” Greg asks.

“Second floor. There is a waiting room on the left when you come out the elevator. I will call the OR and let them know you are here. There is a couple already down there—the people who came in with her.”